The effect of substrate RF losses on the characteristics of silicon-based integrated transformers is studied experimentally by using a substrate transfer technique. The maximum available gain is used to evaluate the quality of transformers similarly to that of active devices. The silicon substrate has a pronounced effect on the quality factor and mutual resistive coupling factor of the primary and...
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This paper describes two integrated RF receivers with low noise and high linearity for GSM900 and DCS1800 base stations. The chips were fabricated using a 0.25-μm BiCMOS process. This is the first silicon-integrated radio front-end that can be used to meet GSM normal and micro base-station specifications reported to date. Noise figure, gain, and output third-order intercept point are 2.1 dB, 25...
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In this paper, we compare the performance of the newly introduced distributed active transformer (DAT) structure to that of conventional on-chip impedance-transformations methods. Their fundamental power-efficiency limitations in the design of high-power fully integrated amplifiers in standard silicon process technologies are analyzed. The DAT is demonstrated to be an efficient impedance-transform...
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An overview is presented of the challenges and design issues in the system-level design of mixed analog-digital telecom front-ends. The progress in very large scale integration technology allows the integration of complex systems on a chip, containing both analog and digital parts. In order to boost the design productivity and guarantee the optimality of such systems while meeting the time-to-mark...
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High-performance analog-to-digital converters, digital-to-analog converters, and fractional-N frequency synthesizers based on delta-sigma (&utri;Σ) modulation - collectively referred to as &utri;Σ data converters have contributed significantly to the high level of integration seen in recent commercial wireless handset transceivers. This paper presents a tutorial on &utri;Σ data c...
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This paper presents an overview of MOS transistor modeling for RF integrated circuit design. It starts with the description of a physical equivalent circuit that can easily be implemented as a SPICE subcircuit. The MOS transistor is divided into an intrinsic part, representing mainly the active part of the device, and an extrinsic part responsible for most of the parasitic elements. A complete cha...
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The concept of concurrent multiband low-noise-amplifiers (LNAs) is introduced. A systematic way to design concurrent multiband integrated LNAs in general is developed. Applications of concurrent multiband LNAs in concurrent multiband receivers together with receiver architecture are discussed. Experimental results of a dual-band LNA implemented in a 0.35-μm CMOS technology as a demonstration of...
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The standardization phase for third-generation wide-band CDMA systems like the universal mobile telecommunication system, which will add broad-band data to support video, Internet access, and other high-speed services for untethered devices is running toward its finalization. As is typical for mobile communication systems standardization, sufficient RF performance has been assumed and most efforts...
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This paper discusses the expectations for the development of radio-frequency systems-on-chip (RF-SoCs) that integrate RF, analog, and digital circuits, and the conditions under which they can be realized. Future RF systems will be increasingly large and complex. However, high integration technology is expected to reduce the circuit size, number of components, and total system cost. Over the past f...
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A frequency-dependent compact model for inductors in high ohmic substrates, which is based on an energy point-of-view, is developed. This approach enables the description of the most important coupling phenomena that take place inside the device. Magnetically induced losses are quite accurately calculated and coupling between electric and magnetic fields is given by means of a delay constant. The ...
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Research over the last ten years has resulted in attempts toward single-chip CMOS RF circuits for Bluetooth, global positioning system, digital enhanced cordless telecommunications and cellular applications. An overview of the use of CMOS for low-cost integration of a high-end cellular RF transceiver front-end is presented. Some fundamental pitfalls and limitations of RF CMOS are discussed. To cir...
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This paper presents a comprehensive study on influences of on-chip electro-static discharge (ESD) protection structures on performance of the circuits being protected. Two novel compact low-parasitic ESD structures were designed for RF and mixed-signal (MS) integrated circuits. Parasitic models of the ESD structures are extracted. RF building-block circuits, including a low-power high-speed op amp...
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This paper presents a technique that optimizes LC-tank CMOS voltage-controlled oscillators (VCOs) by minimizing the product of phase noise and power consumption. Moreover, it shows that the minimum depends on the tank's quality factor Q, the device noise coefficient γ, and the ratio between the maximum oscillation amplitude and supply voltage α. Prototypes, realized in a 0.35-μm pro...
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During the 1990s, we witnessed a string of advances in silicon RF integration: from the introduction of the first integrated silicon bipolar radios for groupe special mobile (GSM) and digital European cordless telephone in the late 1980s toward full single-chip integration capabilities based on silicon-germanium BiCMOS technologies. Where RF design used to be a black art, it is becoming a "normal ...
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Aims & Scope

The IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques focuses on that part of engineering and theory associated with microwave/millimeter-wave components, devices, circuits, and systems involving the generation, modulation, demodulation, control, transmission, and detection of microwave signals. This includes scientific, technical, and industrial, activities. Microwave theory and techniques relates to electromagnetic waves usually in the frequency region between a few MHz and a THz; other spectral regions and wave types are included within the scope of the Society whenever basic microwave theory and techniques can yield useful results. Generally, this occurs in the theory of wave propagation in structures with dimensions comparable to a wavelength, and in the related techniques for analysis and design..